One well-known form of rail anchor assembly is comprised of a metal base plate that later is secured to a wood railroad tie member by multiple bolts or spikes, a pair of generally curved shoulder fittings secured to the metal base plate by welds and spaced apart by a distance which is just slightly greater than the width of the base of the rail that is to be anchored by the assembly, and a pair of spring clips which cooperate with the shoulder fittings and with the base of the rail to fasten and additionally restrain the rail from movement relative to the base plate and its railroad tie support.
In the manufacture of the known rail anchor assembly it has been a common practice to weld each shoulder fitting to the base plate with weld beads positioned at both the shoulder fitting outer end and shoulder fitting rail end, which ends each contact the base plate, and to afterwards grind or machine away that portion of each shoulder fitting rail end weld bead which otherwise would interfere with placement of the track rail on the base plate in the gap between adjacent shoulder fittings. The prior art rail anchor assembly so-manufactured also, in instances wherein it later becomes necessary to replace a shoulder fitting that has become missing during the course of railway operations with another shoulder fitting, requires that the base plate be removed from the rail tie and rail, that a replacement shoulder fitting be welded in its proper position on the base plate, and that again a portion of the replacement shoulder fitting rail end weld bead be ground or machined away to eliminate the otherwise present rail-to-weld bead interference.
We have discovered that the necessity of weld bead removal can be eliminated as to both original manufacture and replacement installation operations by use of an advantageous design feature for the assembly shoulder fitting component of the improved rail anchor.